Chapter 33

Throwing the duvet aside, Luca climbed out of bed. It was the third night in a row he’d had fitful, broken dreams, waking in the small hours, his skin clammy and sweaty.

Luca rubbed his stomach, trying to quell the bubble of acid. Adrian had tried to call him but Luca had let the call go to voicemail. Adrian’s only message had been a hesitation before the call had been disconnected. He hadn’t tried to call back, and the depth of sadness within Luca had only deepened.

Stepping into the shower, Luca stood under the heavy fall of water, its heat failing to relieve the tension in his neck and shoulders that had turned the muscle to stone. He closed his eyes and lifted his face to the cascade. If only it could wash away his anger and upset, his disappointment and the gut wrenching sadness as easily as it washed the sweat from his skin.

Showered and dried, and wrapped in only a towel, he lay on his bed. Dawn was just a suggestion in the sky, but Adrian would be up, getting ready to start another long day. It had been less than a week — barely half a week — since they’d got up together, after what Adrian called his early morning alarm, although he’d been anything but alarmed by what Adrian had done to him, how he’d made him feel. Luca tried to smile, but too tired and too damn sad, the smiled died before it could be born.

His phone lay on the bed next to him, and his fingers feathered across the screen. More than once he’d picked it up, ready to make the call Adrian had ducked out of. Each time he’d put it down, pushing it away. It wasn’t for him to call and — what? Apologise? No, he didn’t owe Adrian an apology. Everything he’d said to Adrian, every word full of both anger and upset, he’d both meant and believed. But it hadn’t stopped his heart from being ripped from his chest.

And then he’d said it, amidst all the turmoil, he’d said it. The word he’d held close, his little secret, nursing and growing it until the time was right for it to see the light. Luca’s bitter laugh was smothered by a sob and he squeezed his eyes tight. No tears, never again. He’d made a promise to himself, when his heart had been broken in two by another man. Now his heart was shattered, and felt beyond mending.

The word he’d guarded had slipped from his tongue, surrounded not with joy but with desolate, bone deep sadness.

Love.

Yes, because he did love Adrian, god but he did. He’d never loved a man the way he loved Adrian. He didn’t know when it had happened, it just had. And Adrian loved him. Luca knew it in every muscle, sinew, cell and atom of his being. He knew it in every kiss, and touch. In every smile, in every whispered word, breath damp and hot as it caressed his flushed, sated body.

But how could love be enough when there wasn’t belief and trust? Without those solid foundations, their love could only be a house of straw, to be scattered on the wind when the first storms came.

* * *

An hour later, Luca sipped his Earl Grey in the solitude of his office at the hotel. His eyelids fluttered to a close, and he breathed in the tea’s rich aroma, in the vain hope it would help to quell the pounding headache that had plagued him over the past days, which no painkiller could dampen down.

His phone pinged with a message, and his eyes snapped open, his heart rate picking up. He forced himself to take a breath, and another sip of tea, before he placed the cup back in its saucer and picked up his mobile. Luca slumped as his heart tumbled. Not Adrian, but Alex, cancelling their scheduled meeting. Thank god. That, at least, was one bright spark in his day. He wasn’t up to ducking from his friend’s shrewd, razor sharp analysis. Finishing his tea, he straightened his shoulders and took a deep breath. Muting his phone, he turned his attention back to his laptop, burying himself as he’d done so often over the years, in the solace and refuge of work.

* * *

The knock at his door made Luca jump, and his gaze flicked from the columns of figures to the clock in the corner of his screen. How in god’s name had five hours passed?

“Come in.” He stretched, his cramped muscles protesting, as the door opened. One of the waitresses smiled as she entered with a tray

Lunch. His stomach protested at the same time it rumbled. He’d eaten barely anything since that day when everything had collapsed around him, picking at whatever was in the fridge before throwing the meagre scraps of his meal into the bin. As soon as she was gone, he took a bite, but his stomach began to churn. Oh god… how the hell could he feel sick? There wasn’t anything in his guts to bring up. He pushed the plate aside and let his head fall into his hands.

They needed to talk. It didn’t matter who made the first move. The silence had to be broken, before it became too thick and too hard to cut through. Where it would take them, he had no idea, but wherever it was it had to be somewhere better than this limbo they were now in. If Adrian couldn’t or wouldn’t break and throw off the chains of the past that bound him tight in his own private prison, if he couldn’t or wouldn’t trust himself to trust, there was no future for them. Luca bent forward, clamping his eyes closed and hissing through clenched teeth as searing pain exploded behind his eyes.

“Jesus,” he gasped, his voice unsteady. He breathed in deep, releasing long and slow. Once, twice, three times, the pain receding.

If Adrian couldn’t or wouldn’t… He would leave, and not look back on the ruins of what might have been. All the passion and fire that sparked between them. All the love that made his breath hitch as his heart galloped out of control, all of it would crumble to nothing. Without trust and belief to bind it all together, passion, fire, and yes, even love, would only ever be bricks without mortar.

Luca pulled himself up straight, taking a moment before he got up and faced himself in the mirror. The strain of the last few days was evident in the dark shadows beneath his eyes and the tight lines at their outer edges, as though he were staring into too bright a day. He ran his hands over his hair, before straightening his cuffs and flicking a speck of non-existent dust from his lapel. The silence had to be breached. There were decisions to be made. Decisions which would make or break them.

Luca picked up his mobile, ready this time to make the call he’d told himself wasn’t his to make. A new voicemail message blinked. How had he… Of course, he’d muted the thing. Maybe Adrian had beaten him to it? But the flare of hope in his chest snuffed out. It wasn’t a number he recognised. He should leave it for now… but his resolve of just moments ago was already weakening. He’d deal with the message, and then he’d call Adrian.

He tapped the play icon and pressed it to his ear.